Eighteen comments

The Girl Who Broke My Heart

This is a good example of flubbed transcription from O’Neill’s 1850. They had the Key signature in G Minor which sounds nice but most of the time I’ve heard it played in D Dorian. I transcribed this striaght from O’Neill’s 1850 including all slurs & stuff, but changed the key signature. I think the B’s could be flatened occasionally as an ornament (a la Clare) but all instances of the e’s are natural anyway. So I went with D Dorian.
It’s a really nice tune & although flatish is not horribly impossible on the whistle or flute.

I think I originally heard this either from a M Coleman or H Gillespie 78. Can’t remember which & I’m pretty sure it went by a different name.

Looking at this tune from a distance - I’m almost positive that modern players have probably transposed this to A Dorian. Only having it from memory & O’Neill’s I can’t say - but that is *exactly the danger of learning tunes from the dots!*

You’re confusing me!
The key/mode you’ve written it in is G mixolydian (which, incidentally, is the key I know it in). By ‘A dorian’, do you actually mean ‘A dorian’, or Dmixolydian, perhaps.

On minor keys: If you listen to Kevin Burke’s recording of it on ‘If the Cap Fits’, he throws in some B-flats now and again to keep us on our toes. I wouldn’t say it’s a definite Gminor, but he certainly imparts a minor-ish feel to it.

Please excuse my pedantry. And count yourself lucky - I have to live with it 24-7.

Modes & Misunderstandings

I didn’t mean to confuse, when i submitted the tune I thought it was DDor but Jeremy corrected it to GMix (both have no sharps or flats) when I said they probably play it in Ador I meant it’s probably been shifted up a 5th with one sharp.

On a flute…

Definitely Dorian

Having puzzled over this tune for a long time I am convinced that part A should be in G dorian (one flat) and part B should in G mixolidian (no sharps or flats). Otherwise all O’Neill’s dots are great.

Miles Krassen also took exception to O’Neill’s G minor (aeolian) key signature and changed it to G major (one sharp). However, in “Fiddler’s Companion” his version is notated “G major – with a hint of minor (!)”. Win other words, an invitation to throw in the B flats, F naturals, F neutrals, and drive the accompanist crazy. (This of course being a fiddle viewpoint)

Compare this tune with one of the few other G minor reels in O’Neill’s 1850 - No. 1474 - “Fairhaired Mary” . This has a key signature of G aeolian but all the E’s are naturalized to make it come out in G dorian.

Kevin Burke’s version: GDor & GMix

Based on Kevin Burke’s version in Sweeney’s Dream, I call the A part GDor and the B part Gmix. Both parts resolve to G, and Kevin’s consistent use of Bflats in the A part and B naturals in the B part make it pretty clear to me. Trust me, I’m a lawyer. I can’t speak for other versions of the tune though.

Similar to:

I am not familiar with this tune, however, the B part of the tune sounds exactly like the French-Canadian tune "Growling Old Man and Cackling Old Woman," as I originally learned to play. I believe that there is another version of Growling… with a variation of the B part that has been recorded elsewhere.

The Girl Who Broke My Heart, X:6

This setting from the great Paddy Cronin of Ré Buí, Co. Kerry and for the majority of his life, West Roxbury, Massachusetts, USA. Cronin can be heard turning it over in the video below. Paddy was a lovely fiddler, and quite the character — best described, perhaps, as "sarcastic". Nonetheless, his playing stands for itself — Cronin’s extensive knowledge of his native Sliabh Luachra style, as taught to him by the great fiddlemaster Patrick O’Keeffe, coupled with a passion for the great Sligo players, namely Michael Coleman, and a bit of classical technical training in his early years in Boston meshed to create the music in the video below. I can’t comment on where Paddy got the setting, or if he came up with it himself, but do know that the tune was known in Sliabh Luachra prior to Paddy’s leaving for Boston. Enjoy.

Re: The Girl Who Broke My Heart

The first part of this tune (depending on how you play it) and especially the second part make me wonder if whoever composed it and/or first used this title was suffering from a bad case of sour grapes…